Oak Bay’s mayor has written to the provincial housing minister to make the case that the district does not require a provincially appointed housing adviser.
In his Wednesday letter, Kevin Murdoch told Ravi Kahlon the municipality has made progress in its attempts to reach provincially set housing targets.
The letter, which acknowledged Oak Bay fell short of its first-year housing target of 56 units by only providing occupancy permits for 16 new units, argued the district has plenty of potential new housing “in stream.”
Murdoch noted that the municipality has also implemented all provincially required policy changes, adding 40 units is the “smallest shortfall” of any of the initial seven non-compliant municipalities.
“A provincial adviser would not be as helpful as additional resources to support Oak Bay such as funding a staff position or assisting [the University of Victoria] with their development planning process,” Murdoch wrote.
Murdoch also reiterated his argument that the number of units counted toward the housing target ought to include those in stages before completion.
He said the regulatory changes Oak Bay has already made have had an effect in increasing housing capacity, with 11 in-stream development applications that could potentially deliver 61 net new dwelling units as of Sept. 30, 2024.
In addition, 70 units were approved but not yet built, he said, adding: “These 131 units better reflect the result of current policies and exceed the 56 units required.”
Murdoch pointed out that it takes at least a year to build new housing, so in order for homes to have counted toward the target in 2024, they would have had to already be in the pipeline before the targets were set in the fall of 2023. He said the district informed the minister in a September 2023 letter that Oak Bay would not be able to hit the first-year target for that reason.
Kahlon put both Oak Bay and West Vancouver on notice last month that they had 30 days to convince him an adviser should not be appointed to help them meet their provincially set housing targets.
According to the ministry, the adviser would be expected to look through previous decisions, bylaws and processes and make recommendations on how to address the problem.
When the targets were first announced, the province suggested municipalities hitting their targets would be more likely to get funding for amenities, while communities that didn’t meet them, or failed to show enough progress, could face provincial intervention.
The province threatened to appoint an independent adviser to assist municipalities that are falling behind, or to overrule a municipality on land-use matters to add more density.
